On the topic of this seemingly eternal fixation on anti-communism, I recall reading a peculiar quotation in the opening pages of William Blatty’s big horror hit “The Exorcist”:
“There's no other explanation for some of the things the Communists did. Like the priest who had eight nails driven into his skull.... And there were seven little boys and their teacher. They were praying the Our Father when soldiers came upon them. One soldier whipped out his bayonet and sliced off the teacher's tongue. The other took chopsticks and drove them into the ears of the seven little boys. How do you treat cases like that?”
At the time I read the book – decades ago – I had a blasé acceptance of this quote, probably thinking: “Yeah sure, why not?” It’s odd to think back to the pre-covid, pre-9/11 days when I shared the prejudices of that affluent West still basking in the comfortable glow of that post-World War 2 complacency when folks were still reasonably assured of a decent life with a dreary but secure and fair paid job. It was easy to accept that “horseshoe” shaped notion of fascism and communism as twin evils that met up at some point.
But when the system’s inescapable decline really started to set in, awareness dawned. In the age of the internet, it was easier to locate sources and I found that the above quote was attributed to one Dr. Tom Dooley, “an American physician who worked in Southeast Asia at the outset of American involvement in the Vietnam War. While serving as a physician in the United States Navy and afterwards, he became known for his humanitarian and anti-communist political activities up until his early death from cancer. After his death, the public learned that he had been recruited as an intelligence operative by the Central Intelligence Agency, and numerous descriptions of atrocities by the Viet Minh in his book Deliver Us From Evil had been fabricated.” (from Wiki – as are the quotes below)
Dooley was recruited as an operative by Lieutenant Colonel Edward G. Lansdale, head of the CIA office in Saigon. And the doctor's “vivid accounts of communist atrocities committed on Catholic refugees appear to have been either fabricated or exaggerated. It has been alleged that Dooley was passing along descriptions of events that had been created by Landsdale and his team”.
Dooley’s book, “Deliver Us From Evil”, “featured exceptionally gory tales of religious persecution. The doctor claimed the Viet Minh jammed chopsticks into the ears of children to keep them from hearing the Lord's Prayer and regularly mutilated Catholic instructors. Most sensationally, he fabricated a story of the Viet Minh pounding nails into the head of a priest” etc. And, “Lederer brokered a deal with Reader's Digest to publish Dooley's claims to their massive audience”.
All of which came to an end when Dooley was found out to be not only gay but something of a superstar in the “underground” scene!
I only cite all this to note how even some now ossified cold war propaganda can be granted a kind of “zombie” life forever after when sneaked into the pages of a pulp bestseller.
“Going to be doing a workshop soon on how Communism has changed over the years to be capable of attacking America. Hope to see you there!”
I love the way these anti-communists present their show as reporting on something radically new ... when the notion of communism “attacking America” was the ancient mantra of the Cold War.
On the topic of this seemingly eternal fixation on anti-communism, I recall reading a peculiar quotation in the opening pages of William Blatty’s big horror hit “The Exorcist”:
“There's no other explanation for some of the things the Communists did. Like the priest who had eight nails driven into his skull.... And there were seven little boys and their teacher. They were praying the Our Father when soldiers came upon them. One soldier whipped out his bayonet and sliced off the teacher's tongue. The other took chopsticks and drove them into the ears of the seven little boys. How do you treat cases like that?”
At the time I read the book – decades ago – I had a blasé acceptance of this quote, probably thinking: “Yeah sure, why not?” It’s odd to think back to the pre-covid, pre-9/11 days when I shared the prejudices of that affluent West still basking in the comfortable glow of that post-World War 2 complacency when folks were still reasonably assured of a decent life with a dreary but secure and fair paid job. It was easy to accept that “horseshoe” shaped notion of fascism and communism as twin evils that met up at some point.
But when the system’s inescapable decline really started to set in, awareness dawned. In the age of the internet, it was easier to locate sources and I found that the above quote was attributed to one Dr. Tom Dooley, “an American physician who worked in Southeast Asia at the outset of American involvement in the Vietnam War. While serving as a physician in the United States Navy and afterwards, he became known for his humanitarian and anti-communist political activities up until his early death from cancer. After his death, the public learned that he had been recruited as an intelligence operative by the Central Intelligence Agency, and numerous descriptions of atrocities by the Viet Minh in his book Deliver Us From Evil had been fabricated.” (from Wiki – as are the quotes below)
Dooley was recruited as an operative by Lieutenant Colonel Edward G. Lansdale, head of the CIA office in Saigon. And the doctor's “vivid accounts of communist atrocities committed on Catholic refugees appear to have been either fabricated or exaggerated. It has been alleged that Dooley was passing along descriptions of events that had been created by Landsdale and his team”.
Dooley’s book, “Deliver Us From Evil”, “featured exceptionally gory tales of religious persecution. The doctor claimed the Viet Minh jammed chopsticks into the ears of children to keep them from hearing the Lord's Prayer and regularly mutilated Catholic instructors. Most sensationally, he fabricated a story of the Viet Minh pounding nails into the head of a priest” etc. And, “Lederer brokered a deal with Reader's Digest to publish Dooley's claims to their massive audience”.
All of which came to an end when Dooley was found out to be not only gay but something of a superstar in the “underground” scene!
I only cite all this to note how even some now ossified cold war propaganda can be granted a kind of “zombie” life forever after when sneaked into the pages of a pulp bestseller.
https://x.com/ConceptualJames/status/1813242415169634327
“Going to be doing a workshop soon on how Communism has changed over the years to be capable of attacking America. Hope to see you there!”
I love the way these anti-communists present their show as reporting on something radically new ... when the notion of communism “attacking America” was the ancient mantra of the Cold War.